RIZPAH

“Rizpah, Oh, Rizpah,” how can we know the depth of the love, you had in your heart? How we yearn and strive to have even a small facet of the faithfulness, you had in your soul. Let us have your courage and tenacity to bring God’s goodness to all that see.

Rizpah’s name means, “coal, hot stone.” She was the daughter of Aiah and one of King Saul’s concubines and she was the mother of two sons; Amoni and Mephibosheth.

There was a famine in the land for three years. By this time, David was king and asked the Lord what this was all about. The Lord told him it was the zealousness of Saul that killed the Gibeonites. David went to the Gibeonites who were alive and asked them what he could do to make some kind of amend for this action. They requested that seven of Saul’s male descendants be given to them to be killed and exposed. They wanted vengeance. David agreed and gave the two sons of Rizpah’s, “Amoni and Mephibosheth” along with five sons of Saul’s daughter Merab and promptly handed them over to the Gibeonites who killed them and exposed them on a hill, each hanging on their own individual post. The Bible further says, “all seven of them fell together; they were put to death during the first days of the harvest, just as the barley harvest was beginning.” 2Sa.3:7 21:8, 10, 11.

A distraught and grievous Rizpah took a sackcloth and spread it out for herself on a rock. Remember, this was harvest time and the rains were held up for the crops to be able to be gathered. She stayed on that rock to watch over the bodies that were hanging upon the posts. She guarded the bodies in the daytime against the birds and from the wild animals at night. Rizpah stayed for five months until King David was told what she was doing and then, the bodies were finally taken down and buried.

True love goes beyond the call of duty. It goes beyond the grave and is a complete sacrifice of self. Just like Jesus did for us. Rizpah looked up, and watched the birds circle in the sky, high above the bodies of those she loved. Did her neck begin to hurt from looking up so much? I picture how she would run out there with a small tree branch, shouting and swishing it in the air to make them leave, when they dared to land upon one of the children. She did this time and time again and I imagine she got pretty weak. Completely spent, she would look at her sons faces and weep. Her heart was completely broken, yet she stayed determined to continue to guard them. Her skin must have gotten burned from the sun day in and day out.

When you think of it, there may have been a relative or friend who brought her water and whatever food they could scrounge up, so she could continue to stay there. Did they try to talk her into coming back home? Did they stay there for awhile with her and keep her company? Did they hold her once in awhile? Did they both cry together, and did Merab, come to her whose five sons were slain along side of hers? I envision them embracing and crying together. After the tears, anger had to come with deep feelings of depression for both of them. Although, Rizpah didn’t have any control over losing her sons, she did what she could do, afterwards.


At night time she would take that same branch and scare away the jackals and other beasts. I imagine as sorrowful as she was, over time she had to fight sleep to stay awake. There were times when she would become drenched by the rain and shiver in the cool evenings. Such was a determined heart. Rizpah literally gave up her life to watch over those bodies. She could not fathom the thought of any of them being torn up by an animal. When David took the bodies, to be buried, they were bones. She had stayed out there and watched her sons decay to rotting flesh and fall to the ground; until there were only bones left on them. Only when they were taken down and buried did Rizpah leave.

We see hateful vengeance on one hand and consider all of the people whose lives were involved when the killings took place. On the other hand, we see the goodness of God in Rizpah. We see her great nurturing spirit of love, full of determination and tenacity to guard over what God had given to her. Her and Merab’s sons were ruefully stolen from them to be a sacrifice to bring a appeasement to the Gibeonites. Two wrongs never make a right. Where she found the strength to do what she did, can only be a supernatural one given by God. How did she manage to go on, when her beloveds were snatched away? She was in mourning, while protecting and guarding.

I admire Rizpah’s strength and determination to follow through with love’s sacrifice. Today we have that choice in our lives, not to the extreme that Rizpah went through, but in the daily decisions we make, we can go the extra mile and ask ourselves; if we are bringing God’s goodness to those we come in contact and are we making profound expressions of kindness towards those who need it the most? We can have the tenacity of Rizpah if we only believe that God is guiding our steps, just like He did hers.